Kanye West

Hello all,


To those who are reading this with the anticipation of finding out what I’ve been up to Down Under for the past few weeks, I’m sorry to disappoint you but this blog is going to be a little different to all the others! So, if you don’t have time to waste, don’t feel obliged to read this!
The purpose of this entry is to talk about something that has been all over the media the past two or three days and something that has really frustrated me and I thought what better way to vent my frustration than write a blog about it – it looks like I really am becoming one of ‘those bloggers’.


The incident that has frustrated me is Kanye West’s antics at the MTV VMA awards 2009. Before I talk about my feelings about it, let me just tell those of you who don’t know my thoughts on Kanye prior to this incident... Kanye is a music artist that I have a lot of respect for and who I’m a big fan of. He started off as an un-known producer and his first real breakthrough was his production on arguably one of the greatest hip-hop albums of all time, The Blueprint by Jay-Z. The album was awarded ‘5mics’ by the Source which I think only 5 other albums have ever achieved! Since then Kanye has released four albums, which have all sold millions of copies! In my opinion, the first 3 were all amazing, but the fourth I couldn’t stand because of the use of that awful Auto-tune!


His influence in the music and fashion world is unquestionable. He more or less pioneered the whole idea of sampling old music into modern day hip-hop (yes it was done before Kanye was around, but never in the way that Mr. West has done it), in the fashion world he made Ralph Lauren cool to wear again for people under the age of 40, and he brought auto-tune to hip-hop (I don’t regard T-Pain as a hip hop artist) although I’m not a fan of auto-tune and I don’t like that he brought it to hip hop it has been very influential in Hip Hop and UK Grime, (thank God that Jay-Z has killed it now)


So anyway, Kanye has been labelled as arrogant by many people and I think I would agree that he is extremely arrogant but it suits his persona and he wouldn’t be Kanye West without that arrogance. However, many people say that he took his arrogance too far on Monday night (I think thats when the VMAs was aired) with what he did. For anyone that has been in hibernation or has managed to avoid the media, a young musician by the name of Taylor Swift was being awarded her first VMA (Best Female Video) ever, and in the middle of her acceptance speech, Kanye jumps onto stage and takes the microphone from her. He basically said that Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time and he was clearly very passionate that she should have won that award. He then passed the mic back to Taylor and walked off stage while she stood there looking as if she had seen a ghost!


What Kanye did was extremely disrespectful and whether it was a publicity stunt or not, it shouldn’t have happened. It’s not the first time he has done this, he did it back in 2006 at the EMAs where some unheard of German band won the award for the best video when Kanye had spent ‘millions’ on his ‘Touch The Sky’ video. Nothing was made of it then because most of the world thought he had a right to be angry about it!


On Tuesday morning, while I was having my breakfast, this had made headline news and they showed the clip and I thought to myself “What have you done Kanye?” and the world had a right to be angry, but since then my opinion has changed completely and I actually sympathise with Kanye. I’m not for one second condoning what he did because I think he went about it in the wrong manor, but the way he has been treated since then I don’t think is right!


Kanye went on the Jay Leno show the following day to apologise about what he had done which I think is a very positive gesture and Jay Leno asked him what Kanye thought his mum would have thought of his antics. I personally feel, that it is incredibly inconsiderate to ask something like that considering it has been less than a year since Kanye’s mum passed away and the man was clearly hurt by it. If Jay Leno asked him this to make him feel a pain or embarrassment the same way that Taylor Swift had felt the previous night, he had succeeded and now I began to feel sorry for Kanye. Then in addition to this, I hear this morning that Barack Obama called Kanye West a ‘jackass’, ok Mr. President didn’t know that he was being recorded but for it to come out in the media will kill Kanye. Kanye at every concert he did in the run-up to the election would tell people to vote for Obama and he is clearly someone that looks up to Obama. So for the most powerful man in the world and his idol to call him a jackass can’t be a good feeling for Kanye!


As well as all this there has been calls to boycott Kanye’s music from influential musicians such as Pink. I think this is taking it a step too far. Kanye hasn’t broken the law or anything, take Chris Brown as an example. What he did to Rihanna was much worse and there was not talk from any musicians (there was from the general public) on boycotting his music. Is the world just hating on urban music once again?


Remember that these are all my personal opinions, so don’t feel you have to agree with them by any means! However, do what I did a few hours ago and watch the Taylor Swift video and watch the Beyonce video and you will realise that Kanye most definitely had a point. The award show is called the VIDEO music awards so shouldn’t the award go to the song with the best video? As I said before I’m not condoning Kanye’s actions because it was utterly disrespectful, but he was just telling the world his opinion and it’s something I know all of us do at home when watching any award ceremony but he just had the guts/stupidity to get up on stage and say it!


The bottom line is, what Kanye did was wrong and should never be repeated but celebrities have done things much worse than Kanye and haven’t been slated so hard by the media as he has! With regards to my thoughts on Kanye, I have lost a little bit respect for him but as long as he makes good music, I will continue buying his music and supporting him!


I know many of you will disagree with what I’ve said, but it’s just my opinion and everyone is entitled to voice their opinion (just like Kanye did)! To be honest all this will do, is increase Taylor Swift’s music sales and decrease Kanye’s, so if it was a publicity stunt, it backfired horribly on Kanye! I do feel sorry for Taylor, but there is no doubt that she will actually benefit from this in the long run!


I’m going away for a few days, so my next blog entry will have a lot of content in it (i hope), including the adventures of sand-boarding, swimming with dolphins and a visit to a reptile farm (I’m dreading that).


Mihir